Carrols Restaurant Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:TAST) Q3 2022 Results Conference Call November 9, 2022 8:30 AM ET

Company Participants

Gretta Miles - Controller

Paulo Pena - CEO, President & Director

Tony Hull - VP, CFO & Treasurer

Conference Call Participants

Jake Bartlett - Truist Securities

Jeremy Hamblin - Craig-Hallum Group

Mary Gresla - Bank of America

Joseph Farricielli - Cantor Fitzgerald

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Carrols Restaurant Group, Inc., Third Quarter 2022 Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Following the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Instructions on how to ask a question will be given at that time.

I would like to remind everyone that this conference call is being recorded today, Wednesday, November 9, 2022 at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time and will be available for replay.

I will now turn the conference over to Gretta Miles, Carrols Controller and Assistant Treasurer. Please go ahead.

Gretta Miles

Thank you, operator, and good morning, everyone. By now, you should have access to our earnings announcement released earlier today and our earnings presentation that are both available on our website at www.carrols.com under the Investor Relations section.

Before we begin our remarks, I would like to remind everyone that our discussion, including answers to questions posed to management, may include forward-looking statements or comments with respect to our strategies, intentions or plans and the future direction of revenues, input costs or other aspects pertaining to our business.

These statements are not guarantees of future performance, and therefore, undue reliance should not be placed on them. We also refer you to our filings with the SEC for more details, both with respect to forward-looking statements, as well as risks that could impact our business and results.

During today's call, we will discuss certain non-GAAP measures that we believe can be useful in evaluating our performance. The presentation of this additional information should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for results prepared in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles, and a reconciliation to comparable GAAP measures is available with our earnings release.

With that, I will now turn the call over to our President and CEO, Paulo Pena.

Paulo?

Paulo Pena

Thank you, Gretta, and good morning, everyone. Having now spent two quarters at the helm of the Carrols team, I'm more convinced than ever of the upside potential of our company. We are making tangible progress on both sales growth and profitability, but we've only just begun, and we're all mindful that there is still work to be done to realize our full potential. We're pleased with our top line momentum during the third quarter. Comparable sales grew 4.9% at our Burger King restaurants and 6.5% at our Popeyes restaurants. At the same time, strengthened restaurant operations drove sequential improvement in our restaurant-level profit margins.